Today in History

Today is Friday, Feb. 8, the 39th day of 2013. There are 326 days left in the year.

Today’s highlight:

On Feb. 8, 1973, Senate leaders named seven members of a select committee to investigate the Watergate scandal, including its chairman, Sen. Sam Ervin, D-N.C.

On this date:

In 1587, Mary, Queen of Scots was beheaded at Fotheringhay Castle in England after she was implicated in a plot to murder her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I.

In 1693, a charter was granted for the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg in the Virginia Colony.

In 1862, the Civil War Battle of Roanoke Island, N.C, ended in victory for Union forces led by Gen. Ambrose Burnside.

In 1904, the Russo-Japanese War, a conflict over control of Manchuria and Korea, began as Japanese forces attacked Port Arthur.

In 1910, the Boy Scouts of America was incorporated.

In 1922, President Warren Harding had a radio installed in the White House.

In 1942, during World War II, Japanese forces began invading Singapore, which fell a week later.

In 1963, members of the Baath Socialist Party overthrew Iraqi Prime Minister Abdel-Karim Kassem, who was executed the next day.

In 1968, three college students were killed in a confrontation with highway patrolmen in Orangeburg, S.C., during a civil rights protest against a whites-only bowling alley.

In 1971, NASDAQ, the world’s first electronic stock exchange, held its first trading day.

In 1989, 144 people were killed when an American-chartered Boeing 707 filled with Italian tourists slammed into a fog-covered mountain in the Azores.

In 1993, General Motors sued NBC, alleging that “Dateline NBC” had rigged two car-truck crashes to show that 1973-to-87 GM pickups were prone to fires in side-impact crashes. (NBC settled the lawsuit the following day and apologized for its “unscientific demonstration.”)